I surprised that so many people are surprised that rock is falling off at Frog. It's a fault line with lots of choss on the top.

There must be dozens of routes at Frog where the crack at ground level is hand sized, and it's an off width by the time your at the top. I'm interested to see when a whole pillar goes. Note all the scree below the cliff line.

With Oden, it was a bit of the roof/overlay that fell of. Let's make a sweepstake on when the next bit of that overlap is going to go.

I climbed there quite a lot about 30 years ago, and falling rock was common. There was a well known climber of the time (who's name escapes me at the moment - so my apologies to their friends and family) who was found dead in his car at top suffering a head wound (I think).

Back when I climbed there, there were only a small handful of people, now it sounds like its chockers full of people. Falling rock, either from loose blocks or off the top must be horrid.

On 31/07/2017 Eduardo Slabofvic wrote:>There must be dozens of routes at Frog where the crack at ground level>is hand sized, and it's an off width by the time your at the top. I'm>interested to see when a whole pillar goes.

It's already happened. I helped carry out some sucker who peeled a whole column at the far western end (Satisfaction, or some other easy gross thing). It was cubic meters of rock. Only damage was a broken pelvis and ankle from the fall, novice belayer managed to keep the leader off the deck. I can't understand how it didn't end in strawberry jam.

On 30/07/2017 Olbert wrote:>So apart from needing a good edit, they suggested cleaning up Frog cracks>so there were no more loose blocks. Crags generally exfoliate, at a greater>or lesser pace.

One of the few things which I remember from 1st year geology was the lesson on mineral decomposition. Quartz sandstone is pretty chemically stable, whereas many volcanic rocks contain minerals which readily decompose once exposed to the atmosphere.

There's a fantastic road cutting near Wollongong which exposed a volcanic dyke intruded into the choss sandstone. Even though the unweathered volcanic rock is much stronger, in the 100 or so years since the cutting was made it has eroded back half a meter further than the surrounding sandstone. Chemical weathering trumps physical weathering (unless glacier or something)

>it is an unrealistic>idea.

I agree to a certain extent, but also think that local climbers might want to keep an eye on things and make judgement calls. If a big flake or block is liable to come off under body weight, the climb is pretty fuched anyway. Bite the bullet and trundle, history be damned.

On 31/07/2017 One Day Hero wrote:>>>One of the few things which I remember from 1st year geology was the lesson>on mineral decomposition. Quartz sandstone is pretty chemically stable,>whereas many volcanic rocks contain minerals which readily decompose once>exposed to the atmosphere.>>

I can recommend any of the second or third pitches of routes at Crookneck if you need any further evidence.

I don't know anyone who's climbed there regularly who hasn't had a close encounter with a flying block

On 31/07/2017 One Day Hero wrote:
local climbers might>want to keep an eye on things and make judgement calls. If a big flake>or block is liable to come off under body weight, the climb is pretty fuched>anyway. Bite the bullet and trundle, history be damned.

On 31/07/2017 Doug wrote:>On 31/07/2017 One Day Hero wrote:> local climbers might>>want to keep an eye on things and make judgement calls. If a big flake>>or block is liable to come off under body weight, the climb is pretty>fuched>>anyway. Bite the bullet and trundle, history be damned.>>+1

This still sends like an unrealistic idea to me. When do you decide something needs to be trundled? The magic block had survived 46 years of people climbing on it. Should it have been trundled in 1971, 2001, last year? Trundling also doesn't necessarily result in clean rock either. The start of sorcerers apprentice is still manky several years after a bunch of it fell down. There's a scary block held up by a tree route on the new route created by the theoryledge fall a few years ago.

How do you clean up the entirety of theory, Bloody Mary, witches cauldron or clockwork orange corner? The top chimney of electric lead? The top 30m of rack and ruin? The bottom and top of peach popsicles? Should the seventh banana chockstones go before they do it of their own accord? The many highly chalked friable flakes and moving chockstones across the crag?

Frog is never going to be a completely safe, user friendly crag. People need to take responsibly for judging what they climb on and place gear behind, the likelihood of failure and the consequences of it. I think the most useful thing that could be done for making frog a safer crag is replacing manky tree anchors and putting anchors in that don't require scrambling over the choss at the top to get off. Despite the friable nature of much of the rock, the vast number of rockfalls occur from topping out and scambling across the top of the cliff and this is an issue that it is actually possible to address.

On 9/08/2017 Wendy wrote:>This still sends like an unrealistic idea to me. When do you decide something>needs to be trundled? The magic block had survived 46 years of people climbing>on it. Should it have been trundled in 1971, 2001, last >year?

Tricky decisions which require judgment. There's no right answer, but if a block is noticeably more wobbly this year than it was last year, I reckon the local sensible heads should look at it and make a call. This already happens more than you'd think.

Sometimes there's no way to trundle, so just put a skull and cross bones in the guide. Sounds like Odin and those things are not a goer anymore.

On 9/08/2017 Dr Nick wrote:>On 9/08/2017 Wendy wrote:>>>How do you clean up the entirety of theory, Bloody Mary, witches cauldron>>or clockwork orange corner? >>Nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

On 10/08/2017 Olbert wrote:>On 9/08/2017 rodw wrote:>>On 9/08/2017 Dr Nick wrote:>>>Nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.>>>>North Korea needs a test site..could be a good fit.>>To bring this debate back to the realms of reasonableness, why don't we>invite National Parks to table and get their land management expertise>to help out.

Are you looking to get climbing banned there due to supposedly unstable cliffs?
If you think I'm jerking your chain then take a look at what happened at Mt Coonowrin (Crookneck)...
☺

On 10/08/2017 Olbert wrote:>>North Korea needs a test site..could be a good fit.>>To bring this debate back to the realms of reasonableness, why don't we>invite National Parks to table and get their land management expertise>to help out.